Going Under
by d0ntbleenk
Summary: The Dread Doctors are in town and they've gone after one of the McCall pack's own. AU Stalia fic.
1. Chapter 1

**Chapter One.**

 _Warm blood feels good -_

 _I can't control it anymore_

 _-Carly Rae Jepsen, Warm Blood_

She woke to a car horn blaring, her heart racing like it was trying to break free from her chest. One glance at the clock on the nightstand told her it was a quarter after two in the morning, making that a full two hours of uninterrupted sleep. A new record.

Malia pushed herself up in the bed, slowly, even though she knew that even the slightest of movement would not wake the sleeping boy next to her. Arm tucked under the pillow, chest rising and falling with even breaths, mouth hanging open slightly, she would not hear a word from him till morning. She tilted her head, running her fingers through the mess of bedridden curls that framed her face, sighing. He did not know how lucky he was. And she would never tell him, not even when he asked her, like he did every morning, "How'd you sleep?"

She turned away from him and grabbed the leather-bound journal from the table next to the bed in one motion, padding across the room and slipping out into the hall without a sound. Malia found herself in the bathroom across from the bedroom, flipping on the light and setting the journal down on the countertop, allowing her eyes to adjust and find herself in the mirror. Staring back at her was the pale, red-eyed face of a sleep-deprived eighteen year old, but that was far from surprising. Six months. It had been six months since her first nightmare, and they had not let up, not for a moment. She saw it every time she closed her eyes, like a bad movie set to replay – the frantic swerve of the wheel, the glaring headlights, the shadow of a woman, the _bang_ , _bang_ of a gun. She saw them die, over and over again, but still was no closer to figuring out _who_ or _why_ or _what_ it all meant.

That's why she kept the journal. Her therapist had insisted that it would help, and then when she'd stopped going, Stiles had insisted, too. She'd listened to Stiles, told herself that maybe he was right, maybe it would help to write down each dream – or nightmare – she had in as much detail as she could and then go over them in the morning. Put the pieces together. But her dreams weren't a picture-perfect puzzle. Every time they went over them it was like someone had taken a hammer to them, broken them into thousands of pieces, and shuffled them around again.

Malia turned her back to the mirror, coming to sit on the floor, opening the journal to the last page she had written. The words 'WHO IS THE DESERT WOLF' were scrawled dead center, taunting her, wishing she had the answers, wishing someone would just give them to her already. But she blew her hair out of her face with a frustrated exhale, and her frustration went with it as she picked up the pen and started writing.

* * *

"You weren't in bed this morning," Stiles said, filling a mug with coffee and pushing it across the counter towards her. "How'd you sleep?"

Malia cringed slightly at the question, though she wasn't surprised he'd asked it. It was more of a reflex now. "Fine," she lied. "I got up early to write my journal" – she pointedly brandished the book, accepting the mug with her other hand – "must've lost track of time."

Stiles didn't acknowledge the lie, but she knew that after all this time, he had to know. He wasn't able to hear her heartbeat the way she was, but he had his ways. He frowned slightly. "Same dream?"

"Same dream," she echoed, before shoving the journal into her backpack and taking a swig of her coffee, signaling the end of the conversation. "We'd better get going. Don't you have a Calculus test today?"

* * *

During her free period, Malia spent her time in the library trying to catch up on some homework she had missed the previous week. It hadn't been for any other reason than the fact that she had neglected to do it, but since she had only just made it to senior status, she did not need to be back on the school's radar again. However, her hope for peace and quiet was short-lived – it seemed that the pack had a lot to talk about as of late.

"…been two weeks since the last chimera," Scott was saying from across the table. "Don't you think that's a little weird?"

"Maybe the Dread Doctors gave up?" Kira offered.

"Yeah," Theo quipped, leaning his forearms onto the table, his elbow too close to Malia's hand. She stared at it for a long moment, willing it to disappear, but Theo didn't seem to notice. "They probably got tired of all of their experiments failing and decided to move on."

Stiles rolled his eyes. "Likely story," he countered, clearly not believing a word the guy said. "Scott's right. The fact that there haven't been any chimeras is weird. Like, _really_ weird." He pulled a crumpled up piece of newspaper out of his pocket then, smoothing it out on the table. "But what's weirder is that there have been a string of disappearances since then. Three _teenagers_."

Scott picked up the newspaper clipping, brows furrowing. "Do you think it's the Dread Doctors… making new chimeras?"

"I don't know," Stiles replied, rubbing the back of his neck as he paced next to the group, the way he did whenever he was really thinking. Malia could practically see the cogs turning in his head.

"Do you guys smell that?" Theo asked suddenly, his head turned slightly in Malia's direction. "It smells like…"

"Blood." Scott finished, his frown deepening.

Malia's eyes raised then, meeting Theo's, and that was enough. "Okay, seriously, I need to finish this paper," she announced, tone thick with annoyance, as she packed her books up and grabbed her bag, turning to leave in search of a new table. "I'll see you guys later."

* * *

Knowing that when she was in a groove with her schoolwork, it was better not to disturb her, Stiles did not wait for her at the end of the day. She could imagine him floundering on the idea, waiting in his Jeep for a few extra minutes, phone in hand, itching to text her, "Are you sure you don't want me to stick around? I can wait." But when the bell rang two-thirty and she still had not heard from him, or heard him approaching her in her secluded corner of the library, Malia knew he had forced himself to leave her to her work and gone home.

Or perhaps on a wild goose chase with Scott for the person behind the disappearances.

Three teenagers. Malia wondered if she had known them.

Her fingers flew across the keyboard of her computer, a present from her father for doing so well in the past year, _click-clacking_ as she typed up her essay on _Brave New World_. It was a wonder that she had learned to type so quickly, but after watching Stiles do it for so long, it had grown on her. Besides, it was a lot easier than writing (her teachers still had trouble deciphering her handwriting, which was not unlike that of a fifth grader).

She was halfway through her second paragraph when she heard movement. Malia froze, the way she always did when she was focusing, tracking the footsteps of the intruder. At this time, the only people that would still be around would be the athletes, and they would not have come all the way up to the library unless they were trying to sneak a make-out session. But even then the library was a stretch. She heard the shuffle again, and then saw a flicker, ever so slightly, accompanied by the garbled noise, like a radio that had lost signal. Her brows furrowed and she started to stand, a low growl rising in her throat, ready to strike. She had encountered the Dread Doctors before, knew what they were like, knew what they wanted.

But they hadn't been around for two weeks, she remembered at the very second a man came into view, rolling a cart with an old radio on it. The custodian.

"Hey, you shouldn't be here," he told her, looking only mildly surprised to find her hiding out up there.

Malia instantly relaxed, blinking and nodding quickly. "Right. Sorry, I'll just finish up at home," she said, gathering up her books and shoving her laptop into her bag before hurrying towards the stairs. As she was about to leave, she heard that garbled, staticky noise again, accompanied by the creak of metal, heavy breathing.

But when she looked back, she found herself alone.

She pushed the door to the library open, barely paying attention to where she was going until she ran headlong into another body. "Watch it –" the person started to warn angrily, before stopping, clearly realizing who it was. "Malia? I thought you went home with the others,"

Malia looked up, eyes landing on a sweaty, smug-looking Theo Raeken. He had a towel hanging over his shoulder, and was busy removing his weight lifting gloves as she knelt down to pick up the books she had dropped in the collision. "What do you want, Theo?" was her impatient reply. He went to hand her the journal that was lying next to his foot and she started ever so slightly. But even the slightest movements were clear as day to a werewolf.

"Is something wrong?" He asked. She could feel his eyes on her, cold, calculating, as she took the journal and piled it on with the rest of her things. "Is that blood?" He gestured toward the pile in her arms, the journal she had just added to it.

"What is it with you and…" She looked down, trailing off as she saw what he was talking about. On the edge of the pages of her journal was, in fact, the deep red coloring of blood. And suddenly she could smell it, too.

Blood.

Undeniably _human_ blood.

It wasn't hers, and it wasn't Stiles' either – she knew his scent, and she knew he would never touch her journal without her consent.

So whose was it?

 _Whose blood was it?_

* * *

 _AN: So there was the first chapter of the story I promised to you tumblr-folks! What did you think? And for those of you not on tumblr... well I guess you'll just have to find out what happens (although I don't think I've been very subtle). Leave a review, share with your friends, and hold on tight for the next installment! xoxo  
_


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two.**

 _Was this what Theo had been talking about?_

Her mouth was dry, but not because she couldn't stand the sight or smell of blood. She'd killed before, she had the instinct. Hell, she even believed that being a killer was genetic. But this was different. This _not knowing_ … it made her sick.

She felt his eyes on her long before he said anything. "Stiles, it's nothing," she sighed, staring up at the ceiling in the dark. She didn't want to know what time it was.

"It's not nothing, or you wouldn't be lying there staring at the ceiling," Stiles pointed out. Malia pursed her lips; he was right, since she would toss and turn when she was having actual trouble sleeping. Now, she had been lying in the same position for what felt like (and was probably) hours. "Tell me what's going on." He yawned.

"You need to sleep," she told him, turning her head and raising a brow.

"Don't look at me like that," he replied, even though she knew he couldn't see her face. Stiles propped himself up on his elbow, facing her. "Just tell me." Silence. "Tell me." More silence. "Malia, I know you aren't asleep." He leaned across her and turned on the lamp, illuminating both of them.

Malia sighed in resignation, before grabbing her journal, opening it up to a random page, and handing it to him. "Fine. _Look_ ," she said.

"Is that –"

"Blood? Yeah,"

"Whose –"

"No idea." Malia swallowed. "You don't think I go on killing sprees in my sleep, do you? I mean, I've read things. About people who sleepwalk and do horrible things…"

"Well, you'd have to actually sleep in order to sleepwalk…" Stiles told her, and she hit him.

"Stiles!"

"Okay, okay sorry. But, seriously, I don't think you're going on killing sprees in your sleep, or while your awake, or _at all_. You're not a cold-blooded killer, Malia," he assured her, brushing her hair out of her face gently. "Don't you think I would know if you were?"

Malia gazed up at him for a long moment, considering. Her first instinct was to say that, no, he probably wouldn't know if she was a killer just by looking at her, or even being around her all the time. No one knew anyone _that_ well. But deep down she knew he had to be right. He'd been right about her before, had talked her down after she found out that she shared the same blood as _Peter Hale_.

But even then…

Stiles handed her the journal back, and she flipped through the pages idly for a few minutes, finding the bloody fingerprints every few pages, barely registering them as she noticed something else. Malia sat up then, looking up at Stiles. "Did you see this?" She asked him. "There are entries missing. It goes from the thirteenth to the fifteenth here, and the twentieth to the twenty-fourth."

"Maybe you just forgot to do ones those days," he reasoned.

"Maybe…" Malia murmured, her eyes still on the dates and the entries that surrounded the ones that were missing. She hadn't missed a day since she'd started writing the journal entries, not even when she had been too busy, or too upset, or at least that's what she'd thought…

How had she missed _so many_ days?

Suddenly, Stiles' hand was covering the journal, and she looked over at him, shaken from her brief reverie. "You know how you're always saying I'm being too paranoid?" Malia tilted her head slightly, waiting for the point. Stiles leaned forward, pecking her on the lips. "Well that's you. Right now. You need to relax, get some sleep; in fact, all of this staying up until the ungodly hours of the morning can't be helping anything."

Malia grumbled but obliged, turning the light off and depositing the journal back in its place on the nightstand, before snuggling up behind Stiles in the bed. She traced a circle on Stiles' shoulder, right where he had been attacked by Donovan. "How do you do it?" she murmured quietly.

"Hmm?" Stiles asked, half-asleep already.

"After you killed Donovan… you were fine after that. I never even guessed until you told me." She could feel him tense up under her fingers, pulling away from her ever so slightly. Malia knew that it was a sensitive subject, but then again, everything was these days.

"I wasn't," Stiles replied finally, allowing himself to breathe. "I was never fine. I'm _not_ fine."

Malia tucked her head and didn't ask anymore of him, knowing that it was late and that she didn't want to upset him any more than she already had by bringing up Donovan. They still had not found his body, and so they were still keeping it a secret from Scott. It seemed to Malia that as long as neither of them brought it up, it was like it didn't happen.

But that wasn't really how the world worked, was it?

* * *

They took their usual seats in History the next morning, Stiles two seats from the front row, Malia to his right, Scott to his front – and Theo a seat back to Malia's right. She felt a snarl rise in her throat, but suppressed it, turning to Stiles and whispering, "You haven't told anyone, right?"

"Who would I tell?" Stiles replied, to which Malia actually growled, and he stiffened, looking at her and saying, "No one. I told no one. I swear."

"Good," she replied, straightening up just as a pair of girls brushed past, hurrying to their seats just as the bell rang for class to begin.

Mr. Yukimura was writing something on the board and saying something about it, but Malia was instantly distracted. It was that sound again – that staticky, radio sound that she had heard the day before in the library. Her eyes slowly scanned the room, but no one else seemed to hear anything. They were all engaged, taking notes, or blatantly not listening to their teacher by playing with their phones or snickering with their neighbors. One guy – she thought his name was Emerson – caught her eye and smirked, before turning back to his friend. It wasn't until she felt Stiles' hand on her arm that she realized that she was about to break her desk in two.

"Miss Tate – is there a problem?" Mr. Yukimura asked.

Malia looked over at Stiles, who clearly shared the worried look that Scott also was sporting, before swallowing and shaking her head. Mr. Yukimura glanced around the classroom before pressing his lips together and tapping the textbook out in front of him. "Good. So you won't have a problem summarizing last night's reading for the class, then?"

She flashed a brief smile, biting her lip and flipping to the pages that had been assigned. As she began to speak, she noticed, out of the corner of her eye, that Emerson was looking at her again.

* * *

"I think I found something," Stiles said that afternoon.

Malia twisted the tip of the red pen between her teeth, looking up at him from where she lay on her stomach on the bed, her eyes taking a moment to focus on the clear board in the middle of the room with tons of writing scrawled haphazardly over it. She registered things like 'DONOVAN', 'DREAD DOCTORS', 'LUCAS', and 'WHO IS THE DESERT WOLF', but he was pointing at something new.

It was a list.

Patrick, Ethan, Tristan.

"These are the names of the victims," he explained. "Patrick. Ethan. Tristan. All students at the high school."

Malia pushed herself up onto her knees, paying closer attention. "Wait, you said victims. Does that mean that all of them… that they're actually dead?"

Stiles shook his head. "Well, no. They still haven't found any bodies. But they've been missing for, well, that's what I think I've found. Patrick's been gone for ten days, Ethan, a week, Tristan, four days. That's, what? Every three days that this guy is taking another person. A poor, unsuspecting kid."

"Well what makes you think that they're totally innocent?" Malia asked, finding herself on her feet now, moving closer to the board. "Hey, didn't that guy try out for lacrosse this year?" She pointed to the picture with 'Ethan' scribbled underneath it. "I mean, these are people that we probably knew, right? Maybe there are other people who knew them, that might know something."

"I wish I could get into this guy's head, you know?" Stiles was saying, staring intently at the board, trying to make sense of it all. "I want to figure this out. Now that the Dread Doctors are gone… I just… feel like I need to do _something_."

Malia walked over and grabbed her History textbook, holding it up for him. "Well here's something."

Stiles smiled and shook his head, pushing the book away. "You know what I mean," he replied. "I mean, for as long as I can remember, we've been mixed up in all of this crazy stuff. It's become a part of my life to figure it all out, get to the bottom of it."

"I know," she said, putting one hand behind his head, running her fingers through his hair comfortingly. "And you will. Just give it some time. Help me out here, I'm drowning in" – she opened the book to the page she'd been on – " _George Washington and the Revolutionary War_."

He frowned, reaching for the book. "You – that's chapter _three_ , how did you get there already?"

"Because that's where we are in class, Stiles!"

"Are you – shit!" Stiles clambored over to the bed, flipping through Malia's notebook as she laughed, joining him and shaking her head. Sometimes it was nice to know that she wasn't the only one who didn't always have it all together.

"Come on," she said. "I'll get you up to speed."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three.**

 _Secrets I have held in my heart_

 _Are harder to hide than I thought_

 _-Arctic Monkeys, I Wanna Be Yours_

"What took you so long?" Lydia demanded as Malia squeezed back through the people on the bleachers to her seat.

"What?" Malia asked, only half-listening, her eyes scanning the swarm of maroon jerseys.

"You said you were just going to the bathroom," the redhead responded, leaning so close she could feel the warmth of her breath on her face. "I thought you fell in."

The scoreboard blared with the end of the game, and the crowd went wild. It was almost as if a switch had been flicked, a bubble, popped; the once tense, motionless crowd of spectators became an animated, whooping-and-hollering throng of die-hard fans. Beacon Hills had won the game, ten to zero.

And it was utter chaos.

Lydia had disappeared almost immediately, forgetting her friend in search of some semblance of safety away from the crowd that was now emptying the bleachers and rushing the field. There were hundreds of people at least, but even from her vantage point, Malia could not discern face from face, player from spectator. After a few minutes and some focus, she managed to pick out Scott and Kira, Liam, and that guy from her History class… Emerson.

Almost as if he could hear her thoughts, the boy looked up towards the stands. Their eyes met for a long moment, and she felt something deep inside of her start to stir –

"Malia!"

She blinked and turned to find Stiles running towards her, and before she knew what was happening, he was lifting her off her feet and spinning her around, his giddy laughter filling the air, blocking out everyone else. "We did it! We won the first game of the season!"

Malia couldn't help but grin. "Didn't I tell you there was nothing to worry about? How many goals did you score this time? Ten? Fifty?"

"None… but there was an assist," he admitted sheepishly, but she didn't stop smiling, holding his face between her hands. She shook her head and kissed him, his arms around her tightening, and that was all she cared about in the world – not that it was freezing out or that he smelled awful or that she had no idea where her friends had gone. But then the moment was over, and he was taking her hand, saying, "Come on. I've got to get my things and then we can go."

"Okay," was all she said, before he pulled her down the bleachers and towards the school.

* * *

After the game, they went home so that Stiles could shower and change into clean clothes. As Malia waited, she couldn't help but let her mind wander back to the last few days, to the missing entries in her journal. And the blood. The mysterious, unidentifiable _blood_ on the pages of her journal. She looked over at the nightstand, where her journal was now tucked away in a drawer, and a brand new one sat on the top, a sticky note on the front bearing her name in the same scrawl that was on the board across the room.

Malia smiled, walking over to the new journal and running her fingers across the cover, wondering how she had gotten so lucky.

Her stomach gurgled uncomfortably, loudly, and she put her hand over it in an attempt to calm it. She just stood there for a second, unsure of how to feel, how to react, until Stiles came back into the room, tossing his dirty clothes into a pile near his closet.

"You okay?" he asked.

Her first thought was to say, "Yeah." Malia smiled and turned to face him, before striding across the room and taking his hand. "Where are we going again?"

* * *

The whole house was vibrating. Inside, the sound of a poppy, synth-based song was blaring, and bodies were everywhere. It looked like furniture had been moved aside for the purpose of the party, and the floor was already coated in a thin film of alcohol.

If anyone knew how to throw a party, it was the BHHS lacrosse team.

"Do you guys do this after every game?" Malia inquired of the stocky brunette standing next to her, not bothering to shout thanks to the fact that he, too, was of the werewolf persuasion.

Liam took a swig of his drink, his eyes scanning the room as his head bobbed mindlessly to the beat of the song. "Only the ones we win," he corrected.

Malia raised an eyebrow but didn't ask him to explain, nursing her own beverage as she tried to find some sign of her boyfriend. Stiles hadn't stuck with her for long, claiming that he was going to find Scott and would be back soon. That was probably an hour ago. Now she was stuck making small talk with a puppy who clearly was too busy looking for Hayden to pay attention to what she was saying.

She sighed, pointing a finger at a dark haired girl arguing with someone about the music. "I think _that's_ where she is."

"Who?" Liam asked coolly, taking another drink.

"Hayden Romero," Malia replied. Liam spit his drink out so suddenly it sprayed all over some guy – well, not _some_ guy but the one that had been plaguing her for days now.

Emerson Wilson let out a very offended, "Dude!" before wiping his face with the back of his hand and storming off, pushing people out of his way. Liam trailed after him, a string of apologies tumbling out of him like an avalanche.

Malia watched them go, disappearing almost instantly into the crowd of teenagers loitering in the hall.

* * *

 _A knock echoed through the room._

" _Occupied!" was the frustrated response from within the bathroom, but they didn't seem to care as they turned the handle, pushed the door open slowly. He looked up into the mirror, catching the reflection. When he recognized the short brown hair, the lean build, he smirked. "I was wondering when you'd show."_

 _The door creaked as it closed, locked._

 _Then came the scream._

 _He struggled, clawed at the hands on him, surprisingly strong. He reached for something, anything to defend himself with, but his assailant was too good, pinning him right where they wanted him. And then there came the teeth – more teeth than he'd ever seen in one mouth. But then he felt a sting, and he couldn't move anymore, couldn't struggle, couldn't fight._

 _He screamed again, a high-pitched, blood-curdling scream that could barely be heard above the blaring of the music downstairs as teeth ripped through flesh, blood splattered walls, tile, ceramic._

 _And then he couldn't scream anymore, his vocal cords shredded._

 _All he could do was bleed._


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter Four.**

 _And I know she'll get the best of me_

 _At least we'll both be numb_

 _-The Weeknd, Can't Feel My Face_

Malia could hear Coach Finstock yelling even from way at the other end of the hallway. And that was even without her super-human hearing.

She let the door clatter loudly as it shut, walking in the direction of the boys locker room just as Stiles emerged from it, followed by Scott and Liam, and soon afterwards, the rest of the lacrosse team. She quirked a brow, nodding towards the locker room. "What was that all about?"

"Finstock's just blown a gasket," Liam said under his breath, shrugging.

"Well, can you blame him? He's now short two guys and is probably wondering if he should ever recruit sophomores again," Stiles explained, before glancing at Liam and adding, "No offense."

"None taken," said the sophomore.

Scott shook his head. "I just don't get it," he started as Kira finally caught up with them, emerging from the girls' locker room down the hall. "They seemed so excited to play and kept up with everyone else. They even took all of Finstock's crap without complaining. Why would they just ditch without saying anything to anyone?"

Stiles was already hitting his friend, thinking. "They wouldn't." He pulled out the newspaper clipping from a few days ago, the one that told them about the disappearances. Malia furrowed her brows.

"Do you just keep that in your pocket all the time?"

He ignored her. "They _wouldn't_ because they're being kidnapped. Taken. Chained up in a basement somewhere by god knows who."

"Okay, you've been watching way too many crime shows," Kira said.

"Maybe they're just tools," Malia offered, holding her books to her chest.

"I'm serious," Stiles insisted, letting out an exasperated breath. He glanced around before lowering his voice slightly. "I mean, why else wouldn't there be bodies? These guys have to be somewhere. It's not like they could have just… _disappeared_ into thin air. There's always something – a trail, a slip-up somewhere. This guy may be good, but he's going to screw up and we're going to know about it –"

"Malia? You've got something…" Kira was pointing towards her nose, a worried look on her face.

Everyone looked at Malia, who seemed taken aback by the observation. But she touched where Kira told her to, feeling something wet coming out of her nose. When she pulled it away, it was a deep red, almost black.

"I don't…" Malia started, trailing off.

She looked around at her friends, her vision going blurry, her legs giving out in a matter of seconds. There was a rush of movement, and somehow Stiles was there first, supporting her as she lay on the floor, blinking. She knew that it was her friends around her, worrying over her, but all she could hear was the garbled speech of a stranger, the heavy breathing inside of a mask.

Malia looked up and it was like looking into the darkness. Three masked men hovered over her, one reaching out. She felt her pulse quicken, her breath come up short.

And that's when she passed out.

* * *

When she finally woke up again, she was in a hospital bed with an IV of fluids hooked up to her arm.

Next to her was Stiles, firmly planted in the chair next to the bed, his head resting on the bed next to her, his hand covering hers. Protective. Malia smiled, scooting to sit up straight, jostling him enough to wake him. He sat up quickly, clearly expecting something to happen. "You're awake."

"Yeah," Malia said carefully, glancing around. "How long have I been here?"

Stiles shrugged, looking at his watch and yawning. "Um," he replied. "Forty-eight, forty-nine hours? Something like that." Her eyes widened and she tried to get up, but he stopped her. "Whoa – I know, that's a lot of time, but trust me, you needed it. You were so sleep deprived that you were getting nose bleeds. I told them to give you something to sleep."

"Wait – what?" Malia touched her face subconsciously, remembering the almost black substance she had seen coming out of her nose, the masks of the Dread Doctors hovering over her… "I was… bleeding?"

"We were all really worried. I convinced my dad to let me stay with you instead of going to school. He didn't like the idea so much," Stiles laughed, though it didn't quite reach his eyes, which were now accompanied by very dark circles. She tried to picture it: Stiles Stilinski, losing sleep over her. What was going on? "Look, if you're still tired, you can keep sleeping. I'm not going anywhere until you're ready."

When he said it, she started to feel tired again. She felt it deep inside, the kind of exhaustion that settled in your muscles, your bones. Malia leaned her head back, and after only a few moments with her eyes closed, she drifted off again.

 _Beep. Beep. Beep._

 _The steady beep of the hospital monitor trilled somewhere to her left, the drip, drip, drip of the IV lulling her back to sleep. Except suddenly she wasn't tired anymore, and her eyes opened, brilliant white light blinding her._

 _She blinked away the spots, letting her vision focus. She tried to move, but found her limbs restrained by thick, leather cuffs – which she should have been able to get out of easily, but something had made her weaker, defenseless. Stiles was gone, and she found herself all alone in that hospital room for what felt like hours – until she heard them. The labored breathing in masks, the clunking of metal-clad feet, the static of electricity as the lights flickered in their presence._

 _Then one was hovering over her, then two, three._

" _Malia," one said, his voice hollow, far away. Something out of a nightmare. She struggled against her restraints, sweating with the effort. All she could think was 'Stiles, where is Stiles' but she was stuck, and she hated being stuck. Her wrists and ankles ached, rubbed raw._

" _Her condition improves."_

 _Somehow, the words didn't comfort her. She could only wonder why she was there – and how she'd gotten there. She remembered what Lydia had told them before, about her experience with the Dread Doctors, about how she had seen them when she had gone into surgery._

 _And how she still couldn't remember if they had done something to her._

 _Then she saw the light reflect off of a large needle, deadly and close, dripping with something lethal. One masked man looked to the other, nodded. Then he looked back to her, and a gloved hand turned her head to one side, exposing her neck to the other. The glare blinded her again, and she wanted to scream. She squeezed her eyes shut and felt hot tears well up behind them, slip down her cheeks as she pulled against the restraints again._

 _And then there it was. Her eyes snapped open, irises a brilliant, ice-cold blue, and she screamed._

And she screamed.

Malia was writhing and kicking and screaming in her bed, unaware of where she was or what she was doing there. She had been asleep for maybe fifteen minutes when the dream had hit her, vivid and painful as if it were real. But it _was_ real, she knew it had to be.

"Malia!" There were at least half a dozen people calling her name, but they all sounded far away, like a dream. "Malia!" Then there were hands on her wrists, trying to _restrain_ her, and almost immediately she pulled away, able to get free this time. She climbed out of the bed and went for the corner, teeth bared, eyes glowing. Everyone backed away from her except one.

" _Malia!_ " Scott growled forcefully, his eyes glowing red, and almost instantly she snapped out of her nightmare.

When she came to, Malia found herself crouching in the corner of the hospital room, arm bleeding from where she had ripped out the IV needle, drenched in sweat and breathing heavily. She looked around at the people in the room – Mrs. McCall, Scott, Kira, Stiles, Mr. Stilinski – and felt like she was going to throw up.

"Malia, what… what did you see?" Stiles asked her tentatively, the first to step closer to her.

She swallowed hard, taking a deep breath before letting her eyes meet her boyfriend's. As far as she could tell, she hadn't hurt him in her fit. "The Dread Doctors." She said, her hand going to her neck absently, but it was smooth as before, no sign of foul play. "They're not done. Far from it."

* * *

After a lot of convincing – and some persuasion on Mrs. McCall's part – Malia was finally allowed to leave. She had been very insistent on getting the hell out of there, but wouldn't tell anyone anymore than what she already had: The Dread Doctors were still around and they were not done experimenting.

Malia peeled off the flimsy hospital gown and let it fall into a crumpled heap on the floor, stepping out of it and moving towards the bed in nothing but her underwear. Her backpack was there, except it was no longer filled with textbooks and papers, but instead a clean pair of clothes courtesy of her boyfriend. As she clasped her bra behind her back and pulled on her jeans, the door opened, but she didn't flinch, completely comfortable with being half naked no matter who the intruder was.

But his scent assaulted her almost immediately, and she knew she didn't have to hide anyway.

"If you're going to ask me about the nightmare again, Stiles, just save it," Malia told him, pulling out her tank top and sweatshirt.

Stiles shut the door behind him, leaning against it. "I don't get it though. The only time you ever saw the Dread Doctors was when you were with Tracy… Why would you be dreaming about that?"

"Maybe it was especially traumatizing," she responded. She glimpsed the ghoulish cover of the book that they'd all read in order to understand the Dread Doctors' motives, their patterns, then quickly zipped her backpack shut and shouldered it.

"You watched your mom and sister die when you were seven. I doubt Tracy's death made a dent."

Malia felt a tinge of disbelief, a momentary flare of anger. But she suppressed it. "I'm tired and want to go home. Can we not do this now?" She moved towards the door but he didn't budge.

Stiles hesitated for a moment, studying her carefully, before realizing his mistake. He shouldn't have brought up the accident, but he was in investigative mode again – it was easy to get caught up in getting the facts and solving the problems instead of just being an understanding human being. "Fine," he said finally, conceding. The corners of Malia's mouth slowly pulled upward, just a little, and she slid her hand into his, opening the door with the other. "Later, then," he added as an afterthought.

She swallowed hard, knowing he wouldn't let it go, and thankful that he was trailing behind her so that he couldn't see the worry on her face.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter Five.**

"Jenny, _come on_."

"Are you kidding right now? I saw you with her yesterday."

"Who? Hannah? I told you, it was nothing –"

"You were _all over_ her, Bobby. Stop – I don't want to hear it. Bobby!" The argument dissolved into a fit of half-hearted protests-turned-giggles, followed by an actual apology and then kissing. Lots of kissing.

Malia groaned, rolling her eyes as she slid the last book from her stack back onto the shelf and moved away from the sounds. It was disgusting, the way that she kept going back to him when everyone knew that he was just as big of a tool as she suspected. When she rounded the corner back to the main part of the library, she was intercepted by her boyfriend, eyes wide and clearly excited about something.

A development in the case.

"They've released pictures of the crime scenes," Stiles said, waving an unmarked folder enthusiastically. Malia raised her brows, unconvinced. "Okay, I stole them. But they were withholding them for a reason."

They walked over to a table that was partially obscured by shelves, where Stiles opened the folder and laid out photographs of the scenes where, allegedly, the now four boys had been abducted from their homes. In each one, there was a splattering of blood, as well as a pool of it on the floor, but otherwise no other indication of where they were taken or who had done it.

Malia frowned. "Are you sure they're not dead? That's a lot of blood."

"The police still don't think that they've been murdered. They like to keep on the positive side of things, hope and all that," Stiles explained, gathering up the photos again and shoving them into the folder as someone walked past.

Looking up, Malia recognized it as Bobby and Jenny, the two she had overheard earlier. "God, I hate that guy."

Stiles followed her line of vision. "Everyone hates him. Don't go into a murderous rage about it." He joked, but his humor wasn't received well, because Malia just pressed her lips together and walked off.

* * *

Malia focused all of her energy on running, one foot in front of the other, left, right, left, right. It was easy enough to distract herself this way, and she had always loved running, probably because of all of her time spent as a coyote. She mostly did it when she was stressed, but to say she was stressed nowadays was a gross understatement.

A few miles in, she stopped to catch her breath, rolling her neck around to release the tension she was carrying in her neck and shoulders. She had only stopped for a minute when she sensed someone else.

"Why are you always lurking?" Malia asked, clearly annoyed just by his presence alone.

Theo leaned against the fence, shaking his head. "What is it with you and Stilinski? Did his suspicion of me rub off on you or did you develop that all on your own?"

Malia shook her head, starting off at a run again. He followed. "I heard about your freak out at the hospital," he told her. "Almost took out Scott's mom? Smooth, real smooth."

"Fuck you," she snapped, running faster.

"You saw them, didn't you?" Theo shouted, keeping up with her pace. "The Dread Doctors. That's what spooked you."

The brunette came to a sudden halt, and even the werewolf's reflexes couldn't anticipate the hand that suddenly wrapped around his neck, slamming him into the ground. Malia knelt on his chest, teeth bared, no-nonsense. "You think you know me, but you don't. If you ever come near me again, I will scratch up that pretty little face of yours until you're _unrecognizable_."

Her eyes flashed and he flashed his own back, growling angrily, until she finally released him and turned, running off the track and towards school without another word.

Theo rubbed his neck, watching her go, smirking slightly as he turned and headed for the parking lot.

* * *

Malia shut the door to the house behind her, tossing her keys into the dish by the door and hanging her coat up on the rack. "Stiles?" She called out, looking up at the ceiling as she kicked off her shoes. "I know you're here, your Jeep is outside in the driveway."

When she still got no answer, she sighed, climbing the stairs to his bedroom, and lo and behold, there he was. He was sitting on his bed with his laptop, headphones in his ears, totally oblivious.

She smiled, crawling up to him from the foot of the bed, pushing the screen of his laptop down as he took his headphones out. "Malia, what –" he began just as she was peeling off the sweaty top that she had gone running in, tossing it carelessly on the floor. "Look," he cleared his throat, "I just want to say that I'm sorry about the joke. I thought it was funny, but I know it wasn't very –" his words were cut off by her mouth on his, kissing him long and slow, before moving to his jaw and up to his ear.

"I forgive you," she told him simply, moving his laptop off the bed and straddling him. "Now shut up and kiss me before I change my mind."

He did what she said for a minute, before suddenly pulling away, brows pulling together. "Wait, wait I forgot I needed to ask you something," Malia nodded, only half-listening, kissing Stiles' neck as he continued, "What did you mean when you said that the Dread Doctors were far from done? How do you know? Did you see them?"

Malia stopped then, pulling back. "I told you already, it was… it was them. I saw them, yeah. I don't know, it was all a blur, really…" she trailed off, her eyes going unfocused as she stared at the wall, a blank expanse of off white. She blinked and suddenly she was in that hospital room again.

She blinked and returned to Stiles' bedroom.

"Is there something you're not telling me?" He asked finally, and she let her eyes find his, could tell that his mind was working again, trying to figure her out.

She wanted more than anything to tell him what she'd really seen, about what they had done to her – or what she'd dreamed they'd done? – but she didn't want him jumping to conclusions. She didn't want him to tell her that she was just being unreasonable again, either.

Because if what she'd seen was real… They had done something to her. Just like all of those other people.

And she didn't want him thinking that, worrying about her any more than he already did.

"No," Malia lied, offering a smile as she cupped his face in her hands, leaning down to kiss him again, slowly at first. He sighed into it, his hands finding her hips, and for a moment, nothing else mattered.

He reached up and peeled off her sports bra, discarding it with her t-shirt, running his hands down her sides as he parted her lips with his owns, kissing her deeper. They broke apart momentarily so she could tug off his shirt, and he lay down on his back, with her still on top, kissing him just as feverishly as before. As his hands explored, finding purchase in her backside, he was completely oblivious to anything else.

Including the ripple of her back, something moving under the skin.

* * *

The banging woke her up first.

It was incessant, the kind that fit well with the present time of night. Malia groaned, rolling over and trying to will the banging noise to stop so that she could go back to sleep. But she knew that Stiles would not get up and answer the door because he couldn't hear it from all the way up here in his room, and his dad was probably still at the station, filling out paperwork, trying to keep his head from exploding from the supernatural madness plaguing Beacon Hills.

So she got up. But not without dragging a half-asleep Stiles with her.

"'m up, 'm up, wha – why are we up?" Stiles was stumbling over his words as he followed Malia down the stairs and into the front hallway to the front door. The banging answered his question.

Stiles, suddenly intrigued, moved past his girlfriend and grabbed the bat that was propped up against the wall next to the door, prepared to strike (despite the fact that his girlfriend had super strength and claws) as he reached for the door handle and opened the door.

Before he could react, Lydia was pushing past him into the house, muttering, "Finally!"

"Uh, Lydia, what are you doing here?" Malia asked, folding her arms across her chest. She was wearing one of Stiles' shirts and nothing else, her hair a tangled mess.

Lydia, however, was wearing the same thing she had been wearing at school, except it looked like she hadn't slept at all. Malia frowned as she noticed that her friend's appearance was a little disheveled, that her usual flawless demeanor was misplaced. "Is everything okay?" Stiles voiced. "Did something happen?"

"I remember," the redhead said, speaking carefully, her eyes raising to meet theirs. "I remember what they did to me."

* * *

A/N: This is probably the weirdest (but most exciting) thing I've ever written. What do you guys think? Theo is a total A-hole right? And what do you think Lydia has to say? Stay tuned!


End file.
